Details
- The author is a highly respected U.S. Bankruptcy Judge with many years of experience in bankruptcy courts and district courts.
- Key topics include:
- - coordinating international insolvency cases
- - recognition of foreign insolvency cases
- - assisting administrators in foreign insolvency cases
- - universality and territoriality
- - choice of law and conflict of laws governing international insolvency cases
- - authorizing a US case trustee to act abroad
- - comity in international insolvency cases
- - moratorium-international aspects
- - judicial coordination of international insolvency case
U.S. International Insolvency Law is designed as the definitive interpretive work on Chapter 15 to the United States Bankruptcy Code, which took effect in October 2005. This code was introduced to coordinate international insolvency cases involving both the United States and one or more foreign countries. With the extensive growth of the international economy, international insolvency cases for international enterprises in financial difficulty are certain to increase. These cases will involve complex legal problems arising from assets located abroad in U.S. cases, foreign creditors in U.S. cases, and parallel cases in various countries for the same business entities. This publication provides valuable guidance to a wide audience of professionals involved in international insolvency cases with U.S. connections, including lawyers, judges, accountants, turnaround specialists and other insolvency professionals. It is also useful as a text for international insolvency courses and to provide guidance to foreign judges, lawyers and other insolvency professionals. The book analyzes the function of each provision of Article 15, and explains its role in an international insolvency case involving related cases in the United States and abroad. The author also explores the general legal framework for commercial disputes such as customary law, applicable treaties and the European Union Regulation on Insolvency Proceedings. These subjects include the extraterritorial application of national insolvency laws (and the application of the principles of universalism and territorialism), comity to foreign courts and foreign judicial decisions, reciprocity, jurisdiction and choice of law, and the allocation of assets to creditors in the affected countries. This annual publication also addresses practical problems that arise in international insolvency cases, such as the negotiation and drafting of protocols for particular cases. It gives recommendations and suggestions on procedures to implement Chapter 15's requirement that courts and professionals from the relevant countries communicate with each other "to the maximum extent possible." Appendices include Chapter 15, the Cross-Border Insolvency Concordat, Guidelines Applicable to Court-to-Court Communications in Cross-Border Cases, the European Union Insolvency Regulation, and samples of protocols adopted in specific international cases. U.S. International Insolvency Law will be produced yearly, and is available for standing order.
Readership: Insolvency attorneys; in-house counsel; libraries; insolvency judges
Part I - Overview
1.0 Introduction
Part II - Statutory Provisions
2.0 Chapter 15 - Ancillary and Other Cross-Border Cases
3.0 Bankruptcy Code Chapter 1 Provisions: Applicable in Chapter 15 Cases
4.0 Bankruptcy Code Chapter 3 Provisions Applicable in Chapter 15 Cases
5.0 Bankruptcy Code Chapter 5 Provisions -Applicable in Chapter 15 Cases
6.0 Applicability of Chapter 15 to Cases under Other Chapters
7.0 Title 28 Provisions Applicable to Chapter 15 Cases
8.0 Bankruptcy Crimes
Part III - Rules
9.0 Federal Rules of Bankruptcy Procedure
Part IV - Jurisdictional and Procedural Issues
10.0 Structure and Jurisdiction of Courts in the United States
11.0 Protocols
12.0 Procedural Issues in Coordinating International Insolvency Cases
13.0 Practical issues in Coordinating International Insolvency Cases
Part V - Corporate Groups
14.0 Coordination of Cases for Related Entities
Part VI - International Law Sources Relevant to International Insolvency
15.0 International Conventions and Other Sources of International Insolvency Law
16.0 Glossary
Appendices
A. UNCITRAL Model Law
B. European Union Insolvency Regulation
C. III-ALI Guidelines for Court-to-Court Communications in Cross-Border Cases
D. Principles of Cooperation Among the NAFTA Countries
E. Cross-Border Insolvency Concordat
F. Sample Protocols
G. General Order re Chapter 15 Procedures
H. Sample Order re Recognition Procedure (In re Basis Yield Alpha Fund (Master)
The Honorable Judge Samuel L. Bufford has served since 1985 as a bankruptcy judge in the Central District of California, one of the busiest bankruptcy courts in the United States. During this time he has overseen nearly 100,000 bankruptcy cases, including more than 2500 Chapter 11 cases. He is the author of one book, numerous law review articles and more than 75 published opinions. In addition, he is a frequent lecturer throughout the United States and abroad on issues of bankruptcy law and legal ethics. Judge Bufford served as editor in chief of the America Bankruptcy Law Journal from 1990 to 1994. Judge Bufford was Nomura Lecturer on Law at Harvard Law School for the winter, 2004 term, where he taught a course in international and comparative insolvency law. He also taught this course at Harvard in 2003. He also serves as an adjunct professor at the University of Southern California Law Center, and has taught at Ohio State University. He earned his law degree from the University of Michigan, where he was an editor of the Michigan Law Review and of the Journal of Law Reform. In addition, he holds a Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Texas.
"Judge Bufford provides important conceptual content and organization that helps the reader to make sense of the relevant law."
--Professor Jay Westbrook
University of Texas School of Law
"Judge Bufford's analyses of case law in this area is accurate and thorough, making it a worthwhile volume on one's shelf for that reason alone... for the practitioner whose needs include both the materials for understanding what the law is and the insight to imagine what the law could be, this work will prove to be a valuable companion."
--Leif M. Clark
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge, Western District of Texas
